Astros report: With plenty of arms, rotation goes to six

Barring a late change of heart, the Astros appear set to start using a six-man rotation instead of five. Lefthander Dallas Keuchel has been informed he’ll start Friday against the Rangers, and Brad Peacock is scheduled to start Saturday. Erik Bedard seems likely to start Sunday.

“We’re definitely considering it,” manager Bo Porter said. “It’s one of those things; we have six guys that have thrown the ball well. As you start to get to this portion of the season, you definitely want to monitor the innings of a lot of these guys to make sure they’re not being overused or throwing too many more innings than what they threw the previous year.

“So that’s definitely something that we’re talking about. We will probably tomorrow make an official announcement of what the rotation is going to be coming out of the off day, but that is something we’re considering.”

Brett Oberholtzer, who has thrown seven scoreless innings in his two starts, and Jarred Cosart have pitched well enough to merit spots in the rotation along with Jordan Lyles, Keuchel and the veteran Bedard.

Martinez likely out for a while

Outfielder J.D. Martinez, who has been on the 15-day disabled list with a sprained left wrist since July 27, isn’t likely to return before September.

“It’s hard to put a timetable on it, but I don’t think so,” Martinez said when asked if he thought he could be back before September.

Martinez’s wrist is still in a cast.

“At this point, I don’t expect him back this month,” general manager Jeff Luhnow said. “We’re going to have to wait and see how he comes along. It’s one of those injuries that we want to make sure when he comes back he’s not still feeling the effects of it, so it will probably be sometime in September.”

First MLB save special for Fields

Righthander Josh Fields’ first major league save Monday night had special significance because it was against the Red Sox, who declined to put him on their 40-man roster last year. The Astros plucked Fields from the Red Sox in the Rule 5 draft last December.

“It does feel pretty good, especially being the team that I came from,” said Fields, who struck out the four batters he faced to earn the save. “I guess at the end of the day, as long as I get my job done out there, I don’t care who it’s against.”

“I can say that I was a little bummed about it, yes,” he said. “I knew it would happen before it happened, but I could say I was a little disappointed. God had a plan, and I found myself here last offseason. I got an incredible opportunity out of that.”

Bun B gives team a good rap

Houston rapper Bun B, who was handed over the reins to the Astros’ Twitter feed on Monday night, is committed to helping the Astros strengthen their ties with Houston’s inner-city and minority communities.

“I’ve been working a lot with the Astros organization as far as trying to come up with new ways of reaching out to the community in the inner cities of Houston,” said Bun B, whose given name is Bernard Freeman. “(Monday) they were nice enough to invite me down here to Minute Maid Park to meet some of the players. I got to meet Bo Porter and just to give me a better sense of what exactly goes on here with the Houston Astros and the organization.”

Bun B proudly dons Astros and Houston attire in his rap videos, and now he’s working to link two of his loves.

“I think it’s just a great opportunity to work with an organization like the Astros to really get out here and get some of these kids who may have interest in sports, specifically in baseball, an opportunity to maybe see what’s going on behind the scenes, maybe get in the position of maybe them being inspired by meeting some of these guys and talking to some of these guys,” he said.

Looking ahead to September

The Astros have started discussing their potential September call-ups.

“We’re already thinking about it,” general manager Jeff Luhnow said. “We’ve got a long stretch right now followed by an off day, and then we have a long stretch, and then there’s no off days going into September. So depending upon how everything is going, everybody who has been up here already is a candidate to come back.

“Then, of course, there’s some guys down there that haven’t been up here that might be considered. It’s something that you begin to talk about now, but we probably won’t make those decisions until the last couple of days.”